


Run To The Water

by JustAnotherObsessedFangirl



Category: Mako Mermaids, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Augments, Before Show, Discrimination, Genetic Engineering, Teen Julian Bashir
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-21
Updated: 2021-01-23
Packaged: 2021-03-13 11:13:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28902450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JustAnotherObsessedFangirl/pseuds/JustAnotherObsessedFangirl
Summary: 15 Year old Julian Bashir has just found out the truth, he is a Augment, the monster under the bed for every child in the Federation and can't deal, so he runs and ends up in a Moon Pool.Note this isn't exactly a crossover with Mako Mermaids, more like I am borrowing the world that was build and changing it around to work with 400 years past that canon and with my idea.
Kudos: 3





	1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything you recognise.**

**Chapter One**

Jules runs.

He keeps his feet moving, tears running down his cheeks, his mind in a whirlwind with what he just learned.

His parents had him experimented on when he was only 6 and had him turned into an Augment freak! The monsters under the bed for humans, all because they didn't want a child with learning disabilities and autism!

Jules shakes his head, trying to get the tears off his face, and the thoughts out of his head.

It doesn't work. The 15 year old lets out a breath as he turns to move off the beach he was running on and onto the rocky waterside field. He remembers some of the 2 months he spent in that hospital, the loneliness, the fear, the pain...so much pain.

But he didn't let himself think about it, but now he is 15 and he started asking questions, why did they move around all time? Why did his parents act like everything he achieved was their achievements? Why is he as strong as a Vulcan? Smarter than any human he's met? Has the best hand-eye coordination of anyone at his current school in Ireland? And a dozen other questions to things that didn't make any sense.

He was horrified at his parents answers, that he is an unnatural freak like those he learned about in school from the Eugenics wars, or more recently Khan. He ran while his Father was still speaking.

And that's how he got here, running on the Irish coast, with his only goal to get somewhere his parents won't find him.

Jules looks ahead of him with his unnatural eyes and spots a cave, good as anywhere. He turns and climbs down, finding himself in a cave that only has a small covering but does a great job of hiding a lovely sea cave that he couldn't spot from above.

He sits down on the edge of the water, taking off his shoes and putting his feet in the water as he stares out at the water and tries to stop crying.

God, his parents changed everything about him. Did they really even love him if they were willing to do this do him?

Jules.

He pauses, is he even really Jules? He was a sweet but not too bright child, Jules is nothing like how he was before, even accounting for changing as he gets older. No he is not Jules Bashir, Jules died 9 years ago.

So can he really keeping claiming to be the boy his parents killed?

He looks up to the full moon that is almost directly overhead, no he isn't Jules and he won't keep pretending to be...maybe Julian? He's never used his full name before, only ever the nickname, more importantly Jules never used that name.

"Julian it is" he nods to himself wiping his tears away. There is nothing he can do to change what his parents did, he sure as hell can't turn them in. They would get a few years jail time but he'd loose almost every avenue of employment, most of his rights and probably just be labelled as incompetent and insane and be locked up in the institution. No what he needs to do is learn where normal for a human of his build and back ground is and never do anything above those levels again. But above all these he cannot let anyone else find out what he is.

BEEP! BEEP!

Jule-no Julian looks down at his wrist comm with a grimace, his Father calling. He presses ignore, the last thing he wants is to talk to his Father right now.

BEEP! BEEP! It immediately rings again, he presses ignore again then turns off his comm.

...only for his comm to turn straight back on and start ringing again. Damn those parental controls! he'll have to buy his own comm that his Father can't turn on automatically.

Julian throws it to the other side of the cave where it keep ringing...

...and ringing...

...and ringing.

Dammit! He needs to block out that dam sound so he can just think for a bloody minute!

Julian looks back to the water...water is pretty good at blocking sound, if he goes deep enough.

He takes off his shirt and jumps in, swimming down to the bottom where he can barely make out the sound of the ringing. Thank god.

He can hold his breath for about 9 minutes so he can stay down til that time is over, hopefully by then his Dad will have given up.

He swims slow circles at the bottom, but looks up when it suddenly gets bright.

The moon is overhead and...what the hell?

Julian swims up to the surface and looks around in wonder as glowing water droplets float upwards and the water around him bubbles.

He stares and keeps staring until the moon moves away and the water goes back to normal.

"What on Earth?" Julian blinks, that shouldn't have been possible. Why, _how_ would normal water do that?

Splash.

Julian spins around at the sound as a figure swims in from the underwater sea entrance...a figure in her late 30's who is blue eyed, white, blond, female upper body with an orange scaled.

"A mermaid" Julian breaths, god a real mermaid. He's heard of aquatic alien life but none that look so much like the Earth myth or have been to Earth. All thoughts of his parents and the truth of himself disappear, even the ringing fades from the front of his mind as excitement and curiosity for the mystery in front of him fills him up.

"Oh my Moon" she gasps, eyes wide. She hold her fist towards him as though threatening him with her blue stoned ring "Don't move Boy!" she orders furiously.

"Its okay" he soothes, "I don't want to harm you" he promises with a kind smile, putting his hands up to show he's not armed "My name is Julian."

"Alice" she nods back not lowering her fist, looking at him with distrust "Sorry kid but this is my fault. I'm 10 minutes late for Moon Pool Duty and now you're screwed," she tells him apologetically.

I'm already screwed, Julian doesn't let himself say. "What do you mean?" he questions, as it starts falling together, Moon Pool. Obviously the moon did something to this chamber and if the way she is looking at him in worry and distrust is anything to go by, it did something to him. "What has it done to me?"

"Not telling you boy" She shakes her head, "look I've been doing this job for 7 years and nothing has ever happened, I don't know what to do?" she admits worriedly.

"Why don't you explain the problem and I can help you with it" he offers.

Her eyes turn suspicious, her guard right back up "Why would a land-person want to help me?"

"Why wouldn't I?" he questions back, "I don't know what your experiences is with humans, err land-people but I hope you won't judge me by it unless you get to know me and can judge me by what you then know" he smiles trying to look as open and kind as he can.

She keeps frowning.

"How about I answer some of your questions first Alice, and if you want you can answer mine after" he tries.

"...Alright" she nods, her face hard "Why are you here? Why'd you decide to go swimming with swim cloths at night?"

Right into the hard questions, great. "I had a fight with my parents" he admits, "I came to the beach to get some air, away from them and found this cave, my Father keeps calling" he gestures to the still ringing comm. "This sort of comm is designed so teenagers cannot ignore their parents, he can turn it back on remotely and make the ringing louder and louder. I wanted to get away from the sound so I went to the bottom of the pool, hoping for a few moments of quiet." he admits truthfully, not wanting to risk her being able to tell he is lying and ruin any chance he may have at learning more about the Mermaid and what this Moon Pool is.

"Can your Father track your comm too?" she asks quickly, looking to the ringing thing.

"No" Julian shakes his head reassuringly, "It is considered an invasion of privacy. They can't track it without going to the police with concerns for my safety and then only the police can follow the comm signal. And my parents aren't going to go to the police over what happened" they'd be mad too even think about bringing the police into him running off.

"Okay" she nods releasing a breath and finally lowering her fist.

Julian puts his hands down and smiles at her.

"...this cave turns land-people into mers" she admits hesitantly, clearly still not sure how much to tell him, still giving my a distrusting look "You were in it under the full moon, that means when you wake up tomorrow you'll have a tail."

Julian freezes, the Moon Pool is going to give him a tail, that is that's impossible, "Do you mean permanently?" he hope's not but real life isn't fantasy books, there is no way outside of non-existent magic that he'd be able to change forms at wil-

"Of course not" Alice scoffs like it is ridiculous, " Only us hatched with tails have them all the time without Moon Crystal's anyway. No you'll have those legs whenever you are dry and a tail a minute you touch a drop of water."

Or maybe his life now is a fantasy book, well he'd rather think about all this than what his parents did. "Alright" Julian nods, "So, another question...why doesn't the Federation know about you?" he questions, unable to hide his curiosity.

She frowns, "We don't trust land-People, the Dark Ages taught us why you can never trust one of you not to cut us up for potion ingredients and the start of you learning science taught us to fear experiments. It doesn't matter what you say now, we can't forget what has already happened."

Julian nods looking away from her, it makes sense, he has read book about the Witch trials and other points in human history where they hunted magic, it makes sense they wouldn't feel they can trust humans, no matter how much they've changed. "Of course. I promise not to tell anyone" maybe he can talk to Alice and get her to see they have changed. Humans might not accept people like him but he knows the big wigs at Starfleet would jump for joy to meet the Mermaids/men.

"Thank you" Alice nods relaxing a little, her head turns to his comm which is ringing louder and louder. "Go home and talk to your parents" she orders, "Come back here tomorrow night and I'll tell you what the high ups had to say."

Julian nods, not saying that he'd rather she drown him than go home right now. Maybe he can sneak past his parents and get out in the morning before they wake up. "Alright, I'll see you tomorrow" he nods, swimming to the side of the pool and climbing out and putting his shirt and shoes back on before heading home.

He takes the longest route and walks at the snail pace but still gets home just before 2am, thankfully his parents have gone to sleep so he's able to go straight to his room and to an uneasy sleep with Kukalaka held tight in his arms, his sleep filled with nightmares of being discovered and looked in the Institute.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

He wakes up early the next morning, and walks out of his room, planning to leave a full 2 and half hours before school starts, when it is still dark out in a hope of getting out before his parents wake up.

….it doesn't work.

"Jules!"

Julian freezes, hand on the door handle to the bathroom. So bloody close, he only needed 5 minutes and he could of walked out the front door. He turns to the woman standing behind him with her arms crossed in a dark red dressing gown, "Mother" he frowns stiffly.

Her eyes widen slightly at him calling him that, before yesterday he always called her Imma and his Father Abba, but Julian has no plans to keep using those fond nicknames, not anymore. He barley wants to keep calling them Mother and Father, they aren't his parents, they are his architects.

"Jules" she sighs, the use of the nickname making his skin crawl, "Your Father and I did this for you. Please stop acting like this, you cannot ignore your Father when he calls, nor can you stay out after midnight!" she frowns disappointedly at him.

Julian looks away guiltily, the Mum tone getting in his head even though he isn't happy with her, he shakes it off. "No Mother, you didn't do this for me you did this for _you_ " he presses the word, "Because you didn't like your child as I was. And I'm not that child anymore, Father and you made sure of that" he opens the bathroom door and locks it behind him.

"God" he sighs, he needs to get away from his parents. Summer holidays starts in a week, maybe he can sigh up for a holiday long camp, get some time to clear his head.

He takes a moment to breath before getting undressed and turning to the shower...

Wait. He will have changed, when he touches the water he'll grow a tail. A smile over takes his face, yes his life is turning into a fantasy book, he doesn't have to think about...things, he can dive into a crazy new world, run to the water for a distraction.

He turns on the bath water instead, waits for it to fill and gets in...then everything lights up, for a moment it feels like _he is_ water and when it fades he is lying in the water with a blue tail.

"Wow" he breaths, it's real. A real tail, his legs are gone, fused together as this long blue tail. Oh he has to go swimming, swimming with this will be fantastic. Though he shouldn't risk open water, their are far too many scanners in orbit that could spot him, perhaps he can book some time at one of the local holodecks, they don't monitor what people do there and it wouldn't be too hard to find a program that has deep water.

KNOCK KNOCK "Jules! Stop hiding in the bathroom like a spoilt toddler!" Father yells at the door, "Your Mother was talking to you! You do not walk away when we are talking to you!"

Of course Mother woke up Father, just what he needed. Julian looks to the door his Father is still banging on, demanding 'Jules' come out. Well looks like he needs to get out before his Father breaks the lock and sees too much. "Give me a minute!" he calls back tensely.

"A minute?" Father scoffs, "Why the hell should I give you a minute? You ran out last night crying like a baby and your Mother said to give you a minute, then you stayed out til after midnight! No I am not going to give you a minute, you are going come out here and listen to me!"

Julian frowns, he needs to get rid of the tail before dear Dad sees, shaking his head he leans forward, hand out flat towards the water as he moves to get the plug out from under his tail...

He pauses looking at the water, it's heating up were his hand is pointing. Julian grins, superpowers, this really is like a fantasy book. He curls his hand slowly, watching as the water gets hotter as his hand becomes more of a fist.

Steam fills his vision, his tail stinging slightly and when the steam clears his legs are back and all the water is gone.

Oh, he is going to have fun figuring out what else he can do.

"JULES!"

But later, he has other problems right now.

Julian gets dressed in his school uniform quickly, puts on his shoes and comm, then takes a deep breath and opens the door.

And is met with Richard Bashir's furious face and Amsha Bashir standing behind him with disappointment aimed at him on her's.

"Finally!" Father huffs, "About time Jules. Now we need to talk, you cannot talk to your Mother like-"

"Like what?" Julian cuts in, "With the truth? You both seem to think I'm crazy for being upset about this, but your the mad one's if you honestly thought I wouldn't be upset to find out I'm the monster under the bed!"

"It doesn't matter what the Federation says" Mother sighs, "You are our son. We did this for you, to give you a chance at a normal life."

"Normal?" Julian raises an eyebrow, "Have you read the laws about Augment restrictions? If anyone finds out I'd be lucky not to be locked up in mental Institution for the rest of my life! But I would definitely lose most of my Federation Rights, I would be assigned an advocate who would make all my legal decisions for me! _If_ I'm not locked away all avenues of higher education would be forbidden, the job restrictions are mad! I'd be lucky if I was allowed to work as a cleaner much less do something worth wild like become a lawyer or a doctor, join Starfleet! Because of what you did not only am I the thing all humans fear but I am going to have to lie everyday for the rest of my life to everyone I'll ever meet!"

Father scoffs rolling his eyes, "You are so ungrateful, only focusing on the negatives. We did this to give you a chance and now you have one!"

"We did this for you Jules, so you could live a life worth living" Mother adds softly.

"No you did this for you" Julian glares back, "You didn't want a son who didn't live up, so you built a better son! You didn't think for one minute how this would affect me, only you!" He stomps past them and to his room, grabs his school bag and goes for the front door, "I can't forgive you for this" he looks his Mother in the eye "Either of you" with that he's out the door.

He walks onto the still dark street and starts on the usual path to school, fuming.

Ungrateful, him ungrateful! Why because he isn't proud to be a freak? Because he isn't happy that they killed Jules and made him in his place?

God, his parents have always been a little full of themselves but this is mad, they really don't care how this affects him at all. He can't stay there if this is how Father is going to act from now on? He should talk to Felix at school today, his best mate will probably let him crash at his place for a while, he'll have questions but Julian should be able to think of some story to tell hi-

A hand grabs his shoulder, pulling him out of his deep thoughts. Julian spins around, dropping his school bag as he moves, surprised to find Alice _standing_ there with legs in street clothes, with two other people a woman (early 50's, white, long brown hair, green eyes and strict look edged into her face) and a man, (early 20's white, black buzzcut hair, blue-green eyes) both dressed in nondescript clothes.

"Alice? What are you doing here?" Julian blinks, he was so caught up in his thoughts about his parents he didn't hear them coming, "I thought you said we'd meet up tonight."

"Well plans change" she frowns, "Julian this is Cynthia" she introduces the woman, ignoring the man "The head of the New Domum Council, our leader."

The leader? Shit what does the leader want with him Julian bows his head respectfully, trying not to look as nervous as he feels, "It is a pleasure to meet you ma'am."

"Hmm" Cynthia frowns at him, "So this is the _boy_ who fell in the Moon Pool."

Julian opens his mouth to speak but closes it when Alice shakes her head and the unnamed man sends him a look telling him it's not a good idea.

"Yes Counsellor" Alice nods her head, "He swore to keep the secret."

Cynthia keeps frowning, "Never trust the word of a boy Alice" she tells her like she's repeating a saying, "Especially a Land-boy."

Alice nods quickly, "Of course Counsellor."

RING RING RING.

Julian sighs, looking to his comm, his Father really needs to stop this.

"It is his Father trying to speak to him" Alice tells the older woman, "It was the same last night."

"I see" Cynthia glares at the comm, "Hand it to me!" she orders.

Julian frowns "Why? What ar-"

"He is speaking to me" Cynthia's face scrunches up in disgust.

"He does not know our ways Ma'am" Alice points out, sending him a warning look and taking the comm from him and hands to the Cynthia.

Cynthia looks at it for moment then throws it to the ground behind her, "Daniel!" she barks.

The man, Daniel steps forward and stomps on the comm, smashing it to bits and stopping the ringing before stepping back, so he is once again standing 4 steps behind Cynthia.

Julian holds back his words of protest, knowing they would do no good.

Now that it is quiet Cynthia looks him over then nods, "Yes, Alice we will be doing as the Council agreed" with that she turns and walks towards the beach, Daniel follows 4 steps behind.

Julian turns to Alice "What was that?" he questions his confusion clear in his face and voice.

Alice sighs, "I think you'll find that I am one of the kinder Mermaids you'll meet when it comes to males."

Julian frowns, "Your society doesn't like men" strange, he's read history books and there has been a lot of discrimination in Earth's history, too much. But it was almost never aimed at men. "What was it Cynthia meant about what the Council agreed?"

She shakes off the thoughts of men and frowns at him, "The Council won't trust the word of a man. They have decided you are to be brought back with us, you'll be placed at one of the boys boarding schools and learn our ways. Once the teachers agree that you can be trusted they'll talk again about you being allowed to return to the surface."

Go underwater? To a magic boarding school? This really is like a fantasy book, though the divide between men and woman doesn't sound pleasant. But it could make good practice for if his secret gets out, if he gets use to being treated like a second class citizen now maybe it won't hurt as much later. "Alright" he nods, "Do I have time to get my things?"

Alice snorts "What point would you have with pants or cotton clothes under water?" she turns and starts walking to the water, "Come on, we don't want to keep Cynthia waiting."

Well it's not like he wants to go home anyway. Julian follows her.


End file.
